


Fair and Tender Ladies

by surrpel



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Bob Dylan - Freeform, Breaking the Fourth Wall, Chronal Disassociation, Cosmic Terror, Depression, Feels, Fíli is an idiot but really cute, Gay, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Kili is confused, Mental Health Issues, Metafiction, Modern Character in Middle Earth, Pop Culture, References to MASH (TV), So Cracked You Can't Believe It, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, The Fourth Wall Will Be Demolished So Hard You Will Not Understand Reality, You'll understand later on, but humorous, reluctant romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-02
Updated: 2020-04-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:54:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23442040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/surrpel/pseuds/surrpel
Summary: [Can I write the summary?] No you can't. [But I want to] No, you can't, I'm the author. [But I am also the narrator.] I know Ben, but you're the semi-omniscient narrator, so it's better if I do it.Anyways, enough of that.This is a story of cosmic terror, a woman just trying to pass her French exam faced with saving her middle school crushes, a inter-dimensional being overwhelmed by his loneliness, and a hobbit and a dwarf who just want to bone.We've got two narrators and a lot of ground to cover so strap in.
Relationships: Bilbo Baggins/Thorin Oakenshield, Fíli (Tolkien)/Original Character(s), Kíli (Tolkien)/Original Character(s)
Kudos: 3





	1. Semi-Omniscient (Prologue)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [StrivingArtist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrivingArtist/gifts).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We introduce our narrator and the metatextual context.

_Before we start, let's talk about the Fourth Wall._

_In any work of fiction or nonfiction, the character's written can either ignore the audience or interact with the audience. You're reading this on Archive of Our Own and by sheer numbers you're probably a woman for her early teens to mid-twenties who has an affinity for tea mugs (respond in the comments and we can have an argument). There kids, I've broken the Fourth Wall, not a big deal, The Marx Brother's perfected it and we here at Fair and Tender Ladies are going to ruin it forever by completely destroying the fourth wall. _

We could imagine this narrator in many ways, but the form seen by the characters in this story seems to show a short young man with shaggy hair . He is bulky but not fat.  The face of the young man  is marked by a deep knowledge followed by another layer of deep annoyance in the face of this knowledge . You can imagine him anyway you want, genderbend him, even imagine him as a large snake. 

He knows you are here; he knows I'm here.  He is not a God (but he may be a god); not a timelord but is a man that at one point or another became unstuck from the fabric of time and space and has been insane ever since . We could estimate his age at around 10,000 years old, but who's counting?

_That's Kelsey, the writer of this story. See, you have me, who is semi-omnisient, but I zone out for half this shit and I didn't take creative writing in college so she's going to do most of the "story structure" and "research" bits. I'm semi-omniscient, but that doesn't mean I know how to order any of this. We you can view all this stuff from the outside, I'll be honest, it's ten times as confusing as looking at it from the inside. _

_I'd rather be hanging out over in the Tarantino Universe right now, but even if you exist independently from time and space, "ya gotta serve somebody," and seeing as how I'm somehow still an atheist, it might as well be Kelsey. She's nice, understanding, and at the very least is not going to force me to hang out in Homestuck. Small blessings. Appreciate them. Also, my name's Ben, and this is not really my story, but I am a fairly prominent character, so you're going to have to deal with me for a bit in order to get to the good stuff. We have to deal with these formatting issues on the front end before somebody leaves a comment asking why Bilbo hasn't shagged Thorin yet. It's coming kids, and I am already goddamn uncomfortable. _

One may also imagine that Ben has said this in a white void or the empty Winter Garden Theater in New York City. He speaks  directly to you in a light Appalachian accent that comes and goes with his moods. And as he walks toward the stage door, he takes a deep breath. After all he knows where this road goes. 

_To my salvation? No, it's something far more stupid than that._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [You know, I think we did a pretty good job] It was 400 words. [I know but still, first Fan Fiction I've ever read to completely ignore the characters of the piece of media it's based on, so that's a start.]


	2. Suicide Is Painless (Part 1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What's With the Helicopters?  
> (I have not a fucking idea.)

The sky above the hills around Hobbiton were clear that morning. Wind about 5 miles per hour. Visibility good. One could almost see the Misty Mountains from this height, though when a hobbit could've seen the landscape from this sort of elevation is unknown. If a hobbit were at this elevation, they would have encountered a surprising development coming in from over the White Downs in the West. It was a metal contraption, emitting a high-pitched whirling sound as it slowly flew over the low rolling hills. 

It was a Bell H-13 Sioux Helicopter, a precarious thing made up of a bubble (currently seating a pilot and one passenger), a metal tail, two gurney attachments at either side, and the characteristic whirling blades. "MASH" was inscribed along the side.

_"Suicide is painless, it br-ings on many chan-ges-"_

"WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?" The pilot looked over at his strange passenger, yelling at him over the droning of the blades.

" _IT'S A SONG. MOSTLY NONSENSE,"_ the passenger yelled back. _"ALTMAN HAD HIS SON WRITE IT TO MAKE SURE IT WAS AS STUPID AS POSSIBLE."_

"I DON'T UNDERSTAND!"

" _IT DOESN'T MATTER. IN FACT, THIS IS A DREAM FROM YOUR PERSPECTIVE ANYWAYS. I'M JUST GLAD I WAS IN KOREA SO I COULD GET A GOOD ENTRANCE."_

"A DREAM?"

At this, the passenger looked deeply frustrated for a moment but proceeded to regain his composure. This conversation had happened many times before.

" _Let me ask you a question."_ The passenger turned over as far as his belt would let him. " _How did we get here?"_

"WE CAME FROM THE AIRFIELD BY THE 4077TH."

" _Yes, but before that?"_

There was a long pause between the two men.

" _And how long have we been flying? Months? 15 minutes? Look down. Is that Korea?"_

The pilot looked down and saw that this was not the war-torn country of Korea, circa 1951. In fact, this land looked to have never encountered any sort of conflict for the last hundred years. No jeeps, only green, fertile land dotted by little chimneys and dirt roads. It was unfamiliar in a sinking way.

" _But man, you shouldn't panic, I mean, you're going to wake up in a sec, so no sweat."_ The passenger had a demeanor that would not normally suggest any sort of calming trait, but this appeared to be a well-practiced speech. 

"So, what do I do?"

_"Nothing, baby, just keep flying. We're going to be landing right around.... there!"_

The passenger pointed over at a clearing in the Northeast, away from the nearest dwellings.

" _Until then, just fly. You have nothing to worry about."_

The passenger could have simply appeared in the clearing or wherever he wanted simply by imagining himself being there.

 _But, what's the fun in that? I always wanted to ride in one of these. Can't imagine how in the last...however long I hadn't visited "Korea, 1950 (a hundred years ago), but it was fun, and_ depressing _but that's Alan Alda for you_ _._

_In any case I was going there because my god complex was itching and that's where I apparently needed to go. Thing is, when you're whatever I am, you apparently get the occasional guidance from whatever entity is directing me. Her name's Kelsey, but entity sounds much more badass. In any case, I was going back to Middle-Earth, where I had spent some considerable time. Middle Earth, or Arda as it is known on The One Wiki to Rule Them All, is a time-consuming sort of world. You get involved in one thing, next thing you know, you've got five different names in five different languages and you've spent a few thousand years arguing with a grumpy old man who COULD use magic but chooses not to._

_A lot of this happened before I adopted my prime directive. Eventually, I kept getting so involved in trying to fix different things that I just decided that if there are infinite realities, reality is sort of like fiction. The people in them are going down their own paths to their own destinies. Who am I to come in a_ deus ex machina _the whole thing? The problem is, the more amount of time you spend in a place, the more you become attached to it, the people in it. That's what made me nervous flying into Hobbiton that morning. I had left Middle Earth for a reason._

The clumsy machine disturbed the tall grass as it depended into the clearing, momentarily settling down as the blades continued to cut through the air. The passenger grabbed a rucksack he'd plundered from a medical tent along with his baseball bat, a wooden Louisville Slugger, undersized but still powerful in the right hands. 

" _THIS IS WHERE I GET OFF!" said the passenger. "It was great talking to you. My name is Ben, by the way."_

"I'M CARSON!" 

_"NICE TO MEET YOU!"_

The two shook hands before Ben exited the craft and ducked away from the helicopter. Without looking back, he began walking away. He took five steps before the loud sound of the helicopter cut off abruptly, like in a movie. At first, it was replaced by still silence before first the crickets returned, followed by the birds and rabbits and other creatures of the earth. 

_"Ah fuck," I thought. This was going to hurt._

* * *

Bilbo Baggins woke up again. Like before. Looking upward, he tried to remember why he was waking up. A simple matter, one would think. That's what one did. A gentlehobbit did not go to sleep at four in the morning pouring over old books, and he did not panic once he realized that this is the last book in the Shire about the outside world. No, one did not do that. They woke up in time to make themselves Breakfast, or at least Second Breakfast. 

Elevenses isn't too bad either. 

He sighed from the bottom of his empty stomach up into the back of his throat. "One foot in front of the other," he thought. 

To many, Bilbo would be considered to be of slightly above average weight. To other hobbits, gossiping about the dweller of Bag End, his frightening weight (and implied inability to eat properly) was Bilbo's one outward admission to his peculiar nature. The talk at the pub ranged from jealously to worry to anger. In every appearance Bilbo was a proper hobbit. If he left his house more than once a week or wasn't skinny as a rail (by hobbit standards) he may not be the subject of conversation every Tuesday. 

Eating into his eggs, Bilbo attempted to remember the day without going to look at his calendar. 

"It can't be Wednesday," he thought. "Lobeila would have woken me up with her knocking by now. No, then it must be Thursday."

It was Friday.

In any case he would begin this day how he began every day, with a pipe on his front porch. 

* * *

The morning dew had turned the tall man's heavy, billowing robes an even darker gray at their edges as he walked up the path into Hobbiton. Others would have long died of heatstroke from such robes on a day such as this, warm verging into hot. But, the one thing Gandalf wasn't was "others". 

He walked leisurely with his massive staff along the dirt path. It had been a time since he had visited Hobbiton, but other matters had...come to light, he would say. However brief, he did look forward to seeing the little, brave, prejudiced, imaginative, and unique creatures. Gandalf pondered this as he looked up to see the shape of a man leaning against a tree down the path. It was a recognizably unfamiliar silhouette, though he had not seen Benjamin take this shape the last time he had seen him. Talking to Benjamin or Máifortian or whatever he was calling himself now could be complicated. Gandalf, in all his wisdom and knowledge of the long and deep lore of old had no real idea what Ben was. He wasn't sure even Ben knew, even though Gandalf had listened to his acquaintance explain what he was a number of times to varying success. The wizard himself was prone to vagueness, non sequiturs, and riddles as well, so at times watching Ben and Gandalf have a discussion was like trying to read _Gravity's Rainbow_. 

But, when Ben appeared to Gandalf, he usually had a reason. 

_"You got a new cloak?"_

_"_ No, Benjamin. Still lacking in pleasantries, I assume."

" _Looks new, but it always looks new, so what do I know? And before you ask, not sure why I'm here yet. I know why you're here, like usual. You're going to talk to Bilbo about going on an adventure with dwarves to mountain to reclaim gold or something. Great, going to be a blast. And also, very important, but for reasons that I can't reveal to you either."_

They stared at each other for a moment, then both beings burst into laughter.

* * *

The prince stared back into his own eye from the reflection in the well-sharpened blade of his sword. It was his father's eyes. He was told this, though he had only passing moments and vague awareness’s of his father. But he could see in his mother's eyes the dual awareness that this was her son but also a ghost of the only man she would ever love. 

He continued drilling here in the woods off the road into Hobbiton. Fíli began every morning this way. Going through the motions he had recorded into his brain for the last 50 years. He refused to forget them, even though that was probably impossible at this point. One does not forget habits of their muscles as one does not forget the shape of their own face. 

Kíli was still back at camp, packing up his supplies, giving the elder brother a few moments to himself. In the coming days, those would be rare. 

So, he drilled. Again. Again. Again. 

* * *

As Gandalf walked up to Bilbo and sparked a seemingly innocuous conversation, Ben walked in the woods behind Bag End, smoking on his pipe, a short, orange, a type that was notable to almost everyone in Middle Earth. He considered various possibilities for being in Middle Earth again. Maybe it was just an observation exercise, or interest. He had a vague memory of reading _The Hobbit_ a very, very long time ago. Maybe it was simple penance. 

"Oh fuck! Get off of me!"

Wrenched out of his thoughts, Ben looked down and saw that he had kicked a young woman. A young woman lying on the ground who also wore the same sort of "modern" clothes that he still dressed in, even after all this time.

_It must be penance after all._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (We stan MASH in this house)


End file.
